TRP 301: The Business Development Shift with Doug Ott

[00:00:10] You're listening to The Rainmaking Podcast, hosted by high stakes headhunter, author, and professional speaker, Scott Love. You're listening to The Rainmaking Podcast, and my name is Scott Love. Thank you for joining me on the show.

[00:00:28] Our special guest today is Doug Ott. Doug is a business development coach and speaker who helps lawyers and consultants grow their practices through curiosity, trust, and consistent relationship building without pretending to be someone that they're not. Now, in my conversation with Doug today, we talk about the business development shift.

[00:00:50] Now, this is actually an interview with Doug about his latest book where you'll be able to go to the show notes and order that book today, just released, called The Business Development Shift, How to Win Clients Through Intellectual Curiosity and Consistency. We've had over 300 guests on the show. Probably about half of them have been authors. I've read all of their books. I would rank this one in the top five.

[00:01:14] I think you need to read this book and study it because this is going to change how you connect with your clients, how you earn trust from prospective clients, and how you grow your practice. One other announcement. The sponsor of this show, SurePoint, is hosting the two-day Managing Partner Lab on May 14th and 15th in New York City, Thursday and Friday for law firms.

[00:01:35] The Managing Partner Lab is a collaborative two-day in-person workshop designed exclusively for managing partners and executive directors of law firms. This is a working session built to help senior firm leaders step away from daily demands and focus on the issues that most directly influence firm performance. Across two days, participants will engage in expert-led discussions, peer collaboration, and practical workshops that translate industry insight into firm-specific plans.

[00:02:05] We've put the link to register and to learn more about the Managing Partner Lab on the show notes of this podcast. So go there and you'll learn more. By the way, I'll be speaking there. So if you attend, come up and say hello. I'd love to meet you. As always, this podcast is sponsored by SharePoint Legal Insights, formerly known as Leopard Solutions, turning legal intelligence into opportunity. And also by The Rainmaking Magazine. Don't lose business to the competition. Read this publication and keep business development top of mind.

[00:02:34] Visit therainmakingmagazine.com today to chart your course to greater rainmaking success. Thanks for listening, and I hope you get some great ideas from my conversation with Doug today. Hey, this is Scott Love with The Rainmaking Podcast. Our special guest today is Doug Ott, and we're talking about the business development shift. Doug, thanks so much for being here on the show. It's a pleasure, Scott. Thanks for having me. Absolutely. And I'm excited to have you here. I've been following you for quite some time.

[00:03:00] I read your articles. I'm on your email newsletter, and I always learn things from you. And I'm really excited to talk about your book today, The Business Development Shift, How to Win Clients Through Intellectual Curiosity and Consistency. And so I think this book really nails it. Half of our guests on the show have been authors, so I've read quite a few books. I would rank this probably in the top five. Out of 150 I've read, probably in the top five.

[00:03:24] I think you've really nailed it, especially for those in the legal profession that, you know, many of them, they're just not natural business developers, so they really have to reframe how they think about this. And so the question I want to start with, you mentioned this reframing from selling to solving. Kind of start with that. Tell us, how can someone that's in professional services, how can they reframe business development from selling to solving problems?

[00:03:55] Yeah, it's a great question. If you think about it, most people, if they don't have proper training or coaching in business development, they've always heard they need to be pitching. They need to pitch the practice. They need to pitch the firm and their services. And that just creates a natural level of uncomfort. I mean, I've been in business development my entire career for over 35 years, and I've never liked to sell to people. I've never liked to be sold to unless I had a specific need. So how do you get around that? Well, if you're, especially in the professional services world,

[00:04:24] where you're building relationships, especially you're building relationships with people who may not need your help today, then maybe down the road. So how do you do that? And that's where I really hone on in the book and also in my coaching and consulting. It's like, this is about being intellectually curious, really understanding what makes these people tick and the challenges and the goals they have in their business to see how you might be. Absolutely right. Right. And if you can approach it with that mindset,

[00:04:53] there is a level of comfort and a level of authenticity that really can come through in that relationship. And I think that's key. Don't you think that's key when you're, when you've got a prospective client that's making a decision, it's that authenticity? Yeah, huge. I was just talking to a friend of mine about this yesterday. And if you can't be your authentic self and it feels too forced, it's never going to work. And everyone has a different style and approach to business development and building those

[00:05:18] relationships. And that's what I really focus in on the book. It's like, find the way where you can be intellectually curious. And a lot of people I work with are introverts and people automatically think, well, if I'm an introvert, I can't sell. Well, that's not true. The introverts actually have an advantage because they don't like to talk about themselves. And when you can make it about the other person and truly be curious about what, what they're trying to solve and some of the challenges they face, now you start to build a relationship that builds that trust.

[00:05:45] That's interesting. And so you talk about the difference between hunting and farming, kind of give us some definitions on that. And what do those mean exactly? Well, when you're first starting out, especially for the younger partners and firms, I mean, there is a level of urgency to go out there and hunt in terms of finding new relationships. And you can do that through networking. You can do that through truly building a level of consistency where you can

[00:06:11] touch with your contacts. The farming is really about what are you doing to build out the existing relationship you have? So for example, I believe it's in chapter four. And one of my clients told me this just really resonated with them. I give the analogy of swimming in the shallow end of the pool and the deep end of the pool. And there are some people who are very good at getting to know a lot of people, the social butterflies out there, but they never go into the deep end of the pool where they take that relationship deeper to the level of trust. So they create this level of awareness,

[00:06:41] but they never spend time in those relationships to build trust. And that's where it really happens. But it takes time. It takes a process. You can't just be one and done meeting someone and say, well, if they know who I am, so if they need help, I figure they'll call me. That doesn't work. And you got to figure out ways to do that in your own authentic way. And that's where a lot of the tools I talk about are in the book. And I liked how you talk about the tale of two lawyers, why visibility matters. And this is on page 16 and 17.

[00:07:08] And you mentioned that one partner stays in touch with past clients, sends relevant articles, asks thoughtful questions, and makes helpful introductions. And the other just focuses solely on client work. He assumes his expertise will speak for itself, but over time his pipeline dries up, not because he's less capable, but because he's out of sight and out of mind. And that's the person I talk to a lot when I'm doing my recruiting work, recruiting corporate and finance partners.

[00:07:35] And some people are saying, you know, I can't move. I'd have a book and I want to grow a book, but I've been too busy just focusing on client development. How do you think a partner in a firm can really overcome that problem? Yeah, that's a good one because the old adage, do good work and more work will follow. And a lot of the more senior rainmakers, they may have actually successfully built a practice with that, through that motto. The markets change. And you know this, Scott, I mean,

[00:08:02] the markets become so competitive. There's so many confident lawyers out there. And if you don't invest the time to stay top of mind, I always say it's not always the best lawyer who gets the work. It's the lawyer who's best at staying top of mind. And you don't have to do it in a self-serving way. I was talking to one rainmaker at a firm and I asked him, I said, how did you build your practice? And this guy's a very successful corporate lawyer down in Southern California. And he said, Doug, I just truly care about people. And I find ways to stay in touch with them because I care

[00:08:29] about them. And whether it's sending a card, wishing them congratulations on a promotion or happy holiday, it doesn't have to be self-serving where if you reach out to someone and say, hey, I'm a little bit light. Do you have any work for me? That doesn't work. And so it's finding ways to connect with people in a level where they appreciate you, you care about them, you're staying top of

[00:08:52] mind. And you can do that through, I'd say in-person connections is important, but I call this one thing I've talked about in my book is quick touch points. The quick touch points are just say, hey, congratulations on your move. Congratulations on the recent result you had in your case. Whatever those things may be, you got to think about it. And most people don't think about it because they're so busy doing billable work. But the successful lawyers, the successful rainmakers are

[00:09:21] always thinking about, okay, who can I stay in touch with in my network just to say hello, just to check in or, hey, I'm going to be in town. Let's grab a coffee while I'm in town. And if you think about, and you've seen this, so many lawyers are programmed just to be heads down their work, be billable, provide quality work, which is important. But that's table stakes in today's market. You need to do more than that. And you need to think of ways to stay in touch with your contacts. And everyone has

[00:09:48] a different approach and different style to it. But there's a level of consistency. And that's why that's part of my title in the book. You need to do it at a consistent level. Tell us how we build that consistency. These are people with competing time demands. They've got to balance everything. And they have to, I mean, they're really, they have to market, they have to sell, they have to do business development. How do you think they can build this consistency in their, in their regular day, Doug? Well, I, I'm a big proponent of being organized and having

[00:10:17] some type of a relationship tracker. It's a tool that I actually give my clients an Excel spreadsheet of understanding, okay, who do I know in my network? When was the last time I reached out to this person? What type of outreach was it? Was it an email that I sent to this person that never got responded to? Or was it a two hour lunch? Those are two different outreaches. And just tracking, you know, and some firms offer client relationship management tools. Those are important too. But having some level of organization so that those important contacts

[00:10:47] don't slip through the cracks. And when I have my clients fill this tool out, it's interesting. When you go through the exercise at first to understand, okay, who do I know? And when was the last time I reached out to them? Oftentimes people say, my gosh, Doug, it's been over years since I reached out to this particular person. And so you need to have some type of accountability where you can keep in touch with these people. And just the small outreach or, hey, let's grab a cup of coffee and catch up or a lunch, whatever it may be. So there is a level of organization

[00:11:15] that's made me successful over my career that I actually help my clients with. It makes a huge difference. So let me kind of dig into what intellectual curiosity means. I like the fact that you say, and this is on page 21, chapter two, intellectual curiosity is more than just a soft skill. It's a strategic advantage. Why is that important to people that are doing business development? How can they really take that and really capitalize on that concept?

[00:11:45] Well, if you think about it, and you mentioned this earlier, the most precious commodity of most lawyers out there and consultants is time. And time is critical. And so, but through being intellectually curious, what you're trying to do is you're trying to understand, okay, how can I potentially help this person? Is this even a viable prospect? And through asking questions to really understand how they would actually work with outside counsel for what type of work?

[00:12:12] Because I've interviewed a lot of in-house, I was at Deloitte, I interviewed a lot of GCs. And I asked them, I said, how have you built your internal team? And they all build it differently. Some have huge internal teams of lawyers, some have very small ones. So you got to understand, okay, for what type of work are they hiring outside counsel? And when would they actually need me? So if you position yourself as a problem solver, not someone who's trying to sell your services, there's a whole

[00:12:38] different mindset shift there. Because you got to ask good diagnostic questions like any good doctor, what are the potential problems they have and how are they currently trying to solve those problems? And when you can start peeling back the layers of the onion, then you're going to understand a little bit more. It's like, okay, I'm getting a better feel for how am I going to help this person in their company? And that's a big shift right there. Because I've mentioned this to a lot of people, I say, try to avoid putting the cart before the horse. When you put the cart before the horse,

[00:13:07] and this is human nature, people would dive in and start talking about their skillset, their experience, cases they've worked on. They'll go on a big monologue about how good they are. And that's understandable because they're trying to impress that prospective client and show them how smart of an attorney they really are. The problem is, is that you've lost the client because they hear this all the time. Here goes another lawyer talking about how great they are. I've heard this a million times, push play. But if you flip it and say, tell me a little bit more

[00:13:36] about you. How do you run your business? What are some of the challenges you have? How do you hire outside firms? What type of firms do you work with? Tell me a little bit more about your internal team. Now you're starting to get into learning a little bit more about how they run their business and how you might be able to fit into that equation. So you have to be that active listener. And I always say, try to follow the 80-20 rule, which is 80% listening and 20% talking. If you can do that, now you're starting to make some progress.

[00:14:02] You know, that's so funny. This whole concept is something I discovered on accident when I was changing my niche 15 years ago. I'd been recruiting since 1995. 2009, 2010, I was making the shift to legal. I'd never done placements in law firms. So when I'm meeting with law firm leaders, I couldn't make a pitch on my story because I didn't have one, but I got really good at asking good questions. And I found that they make a judgment about people based on the quality of questions somebody asks. What do you think about that?

[00:14:32] Yes. Yeah. Oh, spot on. I attended a conference one time and there was a panel of GCs. And what the moderator asked the GCs, what was one of the best pitches you ever heard from a law firm? And one GC said, it was a team of attorneys that came in with a list of really thoughtful questions. It wasn't the PowerPoint deck. It wasn't the leave behinds or the case studies and all of that, because he sees that all the time. He said, it told me that they really cared about my business.

[00:15:00] They researched my company and myself, and they even challenged me with some of those questions. He said, that's the type of firm I want to work with. That's great. I have actually a really good story I want to share with you real quick on this, Scott, because it's in the book. I was working with a consulting firm in Sao Paulo, Brazil, and they had a big pitch that they were going to pitch this client. And so we went through all the prep and they said they had their PowerPoint deck, the case studies, the qualifications, everything else. And I said, okay, I want you to scrap all of that. And they looked at me like a deer in headlight.

[00:15:30] It's like, but Doug, this is how we always pitch. I said, yeah, I know. But why don't you go in there with a blank document and a pen? Do the research, have a list of really thoughtful questions you can ask and talk with them as if you've already been hired. Dive into their challenges and their problems. So they did that. And two weeks later, when I asked, we met again, I said, how'd the pitch go? And they said, it was the best pitch we've ever had because we followed your advice and we had a

[00:15:56] two hour conversation and we only talked about ourselves for about 10 minutes. And they won the work because the client said, this is the type of firm we want to work with. And if people can grasp that concept, they'll see a huge shift in how they build relationships. Yeah. Well, how about that? And when work. That's great. I love that story. I remember reading about that. Let me kind of ask you this. You talk about the language that we should use. You talk about the language of passive language

[00:16:24] and active language. What's the difference? And why should we be careful about the language that we use when we talk to our clients? I love you brought that up. And we're all guilty of passive language. Passive language is if I saw you walking down the street and I said, Scott, good to see you. We should catch up sometime. And you said, that sounds great, Doug. And we part ways. What usually happens? Nothing. Right. It's just kind of like a blow off statement or, Hey, if you ever need help around intellectual property work, give me a call. That's what I do. I'm an IP lawyer.

[00:16:54] Oh, sounds good. We make passive statements, which basically lets us off the hook and it lets the client off the hook because the typical response is, sounds good. I'll let you know. Or even in an email in written form, you might say, Hey, in the last closing paragraph or email, it'd be great to catch up sometime. Maybe we can catch up in the next few weeks. There's nothing concrete. You're making passive statements. And in a proactive language, you're saying, Hey, tell me a little bit more about, Hey,

[00:17:23] Scott, good to see you. I haven't seen you in a while. What are you doing next week? Do you want to grab lunch? I'll be in the office on Tuesday and Thursday. Now you're on the hook. You have to say yes or no. Correct. Or if you say, Hey, do you ever need help around intellectual property work? And if so, who do you usually work with? And so there's a big difference there. And so if we could just shift or even in the email, say instead of, Hey, we should catch up in the next

[00:17:49] few weeks to say, Hey, look at, I'm going to be in town or I got some time in two weeks from now on Tuesday and Thursday for lunch. Do you have time to grab lunch? These are all proactive questions that actually force the conversation forward. And so, you know, I, I always challenge people to catch yourself making those passive statements and try to flip it into proactive question. And you can move that relationship. That's a great tip. If they did that with everybody that they talk to, I bet they would be willing to have, I bet they'd have a lot more

[00:18:16] action in terms of activity, you know, in terms of new meetings, new matters, new introductions, new connections. I like that. If they just think in terms of passive, make it active and with a date, with a goal of another connection. So I think that's such a great tip. Well, look, a lot of what I teach and coach and what I wrote about in this book are just based from mistakes I've made in my career. And it's, and I figured, you know what, let's, let's be a little more proactive here. And, uh, it really makes a difference.

[00:18:46] Yeah, that's absolutely right. So there was another question I had for you here. You talk about curiosity killers, common mistakes that derail business development conversations. And this first one here, I wanted to talk about this jumping too quickly to a solution. And you mentioned this, when that conversation shifts from curiosity to making a suggestion about hiring me to work on that matter, tell me about that delicate and nuanced conversation. And how do we know when

[00:19:15] we're jumping to a solution too soon? Yeah, that's, you know, I'm guilty of this in my marriage. My wife, I always jumped to the conclusion. I want to be the problem solver and try to fix my wife's problems. And she doesn't want to hear it because we're oftentimes wired to be the problem solvers. And so we're so excited to solve the problem. We don't really ask the question behind the questions and we'll tell me a little bit more about how that impacts your business. What are you trying to do right now? And we just want to jump to the conclusion too quickly. And when you do that,

[00:19:44] that really does kill the momentum and the truth that you're trying to get out of this person saying, well, why is it important to you? So, so tell me a little bit more how that really impacts your business. And if we could just pause and fight that urge to jump in and solve their problems, you might really understand the reasoning behind what's going on and how they're trying to solve it. That's that whole intellectual curiosity part of it. It's like, and if you can do that,

[00:20:10] and you've, you've seen this Scott where the really good successful people, it's not about them. They're not trying to prove how smart they are. It's all about the other person. And when you can have that conversation, that person might walk away saying, you know what? I really like this person. Yeah. They really, they thought through things that didn't. Cause if you think about how oftentimes people come in and you have this templated proposal saying, this is how we're

[00:20:36] going to solve your problems. A lot of the buyers don't want to hear that. They want, they look at that as an arrogant approach. We've done this for thousands of farmer companies. This is how we do it. It's like, well, what about us? We're different. And so I've won a lot of work from people saying, Doug, the reason why we decided to go with you and your team is because we feel like you really understand it. Right. Because I paused and I asked more of the questions and didn't I just jump to the conclusion. So how do you know when the prospect is ready to say,

[00:21:05] okay, I'm ready to receive the information about working with you and enter into a contract. How do you know when that time is right? Oftentimes they'll tell you or you can ask. And so sometimes you can tell that it's too early in the stage and you just pause there and wait until that, because there's a lot of, a lot of it's timing. So much of this is timing. And I tell people like business development is all about being active in the marketplace. Activity begets results. And when

[00:21:33] the more you active are in the marketplace, the better the timing, you'll just be at the right place at the right time. And so when you're not lunging for the work and trying to say, well, look at, can we help you now? That might come across as too desperate, especially if you don't have a lot of work on your plate. And if you think about it, a lot of lawyers will invest more time in business development when they don't have a lot of work to do. Whereas I asked a leader at Deloitte when I was working with him, I said, when you're really busy, because I hear this a lot from lawyers,

[00:22:03] do you still do business development? He goes, oh, heck yeah. So why is that? He says, that's the best time to be doing business development because you have more to talk about. You have more to talk. You're not desperate for the work. You're not trying to close the deal. You want to make sure that you help these people on their timeline, not yours. And when you make the agenda, your agenda, not the client's agenda, you lose nine times out of 10. I liked how you wrote about that in the book. That was insightful when you said that. I'm like,

[00:22:29] you're absolutely right. I'd never thought about that before. The easiest time to get more business is when you're covered up with work because you have more things to talk about with people. And I think they see that as, oh, here's someone that's in demand instead of operators standing by. I'm ready to, I've got all this time I'm happy to give you. It's better to say I'm extremely busy, but I think I might be able to solve your problem. I'd like to learn more about that. And I'd be willing to welcome you into my portfolio of clients. You know, I think, I think that's what people,

[00:22:57] you know, key decision makers with their livelihood depends on choosing the right professional services provider. I think that's what they're looking for. What do you, what do you think about that done? Yeah, definitely. I mean, it's, I, when I started my practice about 10 years ago, I interviewed about 12 rainmakers, both in law firms and consulting firms. And there is one common thread that I saw and I heard from all of them. They're always doing business development. Now they might not be doing as much when they're really busy with the client matter, but they never take the

[00:23:25] foot off the gas. And that's, that's the difference. That's where they're consistently building a successful practice year after year. The difference is with a lot of amateur business development professionals in the legal and consulting space is that they own, they treat business development as an optional activity they do when they have time. And the challenge with that is you can always justify why you don't have time to do business development. Hey, I just landed a big matter. Fantastic. I don't

[00:23:52] have to do any more BD. That's a kiss of death. Now I tell people, it's like, look at, reach out to one person first thing in the morning before you dive into your inbox. How long does that take? Three to five minutes. If you're not overthinking the email, don't try to batch business development activity into an hour or two hour chunks, because that oftentimes will get pushed aside due to client emergencies. But if you can be disciplined to invest five minutes first thing in the morning to reach

[00:24:18] out to one person and then get on with their busy day, you're keeping that pipeline healthy. You're keeping it full. And that's where a lot of people need to shift in the way they think and the way they operate around building a practice. That's great advice, Doug. Tell me about someone that you worked with. You don't have to mention that person's name, of course, but when they really adopted this model, what was it that went through their mind? How did they get to this point? And then what changes did

[00:24:44] they make and what success did they see? Well, actually, it's a story in the book and you might've read this. It's about a guy I worked with per law firm in San Francisco, and he was a fantastic lawyer. People loved him, good quality work, couldn't bring in any clients. And so when I was working with them, sure, I gave them all the tools and insights and strategies about being successful in business development. But the thing that he embraced the most was investing a little bit of time every day

[00:25:10] in business development. I give people some, I call it the 15 minute rules. Like if you can invest 15 minutes a day, first thing in the morning, BD, wake up 15 minutes earlier if you need to. Before your day gets started, think about business development where it's spending time on LinkedIn, updating your relationship tracker, reaching out to some people just a little bit, then that's going to compound over time. So when we finished working together, I received an email from him three and a

[00:25:36] half years later. And he said, thank you. I said, okay, what's going on? He says, I took to heart what you said about the 15 minutes a day and I stuck with it as best I could. And it compounded over time. And then today he's now one of the top revenue generators of the firm. And he's the chairman of the litigation group. And so that, but it took time. It doesn't, I think the challenge a lot of people are looking for is looking for a quick fix. And that typically doesn't happen. You're building

[00:26:04] behavioral habits. I do that will stick over time. So when you start sticking with it and stay consistent with it, it's going to, you're going to see a huge shift in your productivity over the next year or two or three years. Well, thank you for sharing that story, Doug. And thank you for being a guest on the Rainmaking Podcast. As we bring our time to a close, I always like to summarize with three action steps. What are three action steps somebody could take to really start implementing

[00:26:30] these ideas into their daily practice? Great question. I'd say the first one is be patient. Business development is a long-term game. And so this is all in the mind here. You need to be patient. And successful lawyers tend to be very impatient. I'm myself included. You know, you always want to see instant success, but if you can be patient and stick with it, and then be consistent, stick with it, start developing some habits that you can do that's realistic for you, but continue to do it week in and week out, and that'll compound.

[00:26:59] And then the last is be resilient. Don't take this personally. And that's one of the hardest things for people to embrace. Business development, you're in a business. And when you reach out to people and they don't get back to you, that human tendency is to start getting those negative thoughts thinking, oh, maybe this person doesn't want to work with me. Maybe I said it wrong. Nine times out of 10, it has nothing to do with you. Okay. So if you can actually move forward with business development by not taking this personally, understand you're in a business.

[00:27:28] That's great, Doug. Thank you for being on the show. And before we leave, we're going to put your link to your book so people can order it on the show notes. We'll put that directly and all of your contact information for people to connect with you directly, Doug. But tell us more about your offerings and services that you'd like our listeners to know about. Yeah. So I'm a business development coach and consultant. I work primarily as law firms and consulting firms and entrepreneurs. People are trying to grow a business in the professional

[00:27:55] services space. I love this space because it's very nuanced. It's very challenging. You're not selling a house or a car. You're building a relationship so that someone down the road might need your help. They'll think about calling you first. And so I offer one-on-one coaching, group coaching. I work with a lot of firms of all sizes. I do keynote presentations. And so that's really the bulk of my business. And I've been doing it for 10 years and it's the best thing I've ever done.

[00:28:22] Doug, thank you for being on the show. Like I mentioned, we're going to put all of your contact info, including information where people can order the book directly on the show notes. Thanks for being a great guest today, Doug. And I'd love to have you back on the show in the future. Absolutely, Scott. Great talking to you. Thanks for having me. Thank you for listening to The Rainmaking Podcast. For more information about our recruiting services for

[00:28:47] international law firms, visit our website at attorneysearchgroup.com. To inquire about having Scott speak at your next convention, conference, sales meeting, or executive retreat, visit therainmakingpodcast.com.